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Google messing with Gmail again

Why????

I hate everything* that has been added to gmail in the past few years. I want a simple layout (not lots of odd scrolling parts), no chat-like "new compose", and no new inbox [that] put[s me]back in contro.

My simple question: How can I remove the labels Social, Promotions, Updates, Forums from being used in Gmail? I don't want my labels (as a dropdown to add/remove labels) cluttered with stupid terms I don't use. I have my own labels.

My more complicated question: why can't Google just leave it alone? These updates really frustrate me, especially when, this time anyway, I had no warning or chance to reject it (at least for a while).

(*Well, not everything. I like that typing "unr...." in the search bar brings up the pseudo-label "unread" to find all of my unread messages. But there was a simple workaround before, and it was silly to not have that in the first place. But otherwise, yes, everything.)

I have a GMail account but I never login online for much of the same reason. I only got one to link with YouTube and Analytics, etc., but I only have it feeding emails into my iPhone.

I much prefer the Yahoo layout but even that service frustrates me. I plugged my sisters iPhone into my laptop to set her up an iTunes playlist, and the next thing I know, all of her contacts have been imported into my Yahoo email account. AAARRRRRRGGGGGGGHHHHHH!!! I'm not much of an iTunes buff but all this auto-importing/backup cloud contacts stuff winds me up! My contacts are in my phone and I want them to stay there, and only there... apart from my handbag-dwelling notebook with a rubber band round it That's my idea of secure backup storage - LOL

The reason I object so strongly is because my 'wishes' as you call them are that Google would stop making changes because they're annoying and excessive (or stop forcing me to update with these changes-- I don't mind options). I'm not asking for a "feature request". It would be unfair of me to expect Google to do something just because I want them to. But is it unreasonable for me to want them to not make their product systematically worse? I've been using Gmail since the beginning and overall I love it, but in the past year or so I've become increasingly frustrated with these awkward non-improvements, and I'm wondering whether it's time to give up. That's pathetic, in my opinion. All I want is no changes, or optional ones.

My local internet/cable phone service is provided by a company called Thames Valley Communications.

It is a local company that was owned by the town/city I live in untill a couple months ago.

About 10 months ago they went to gmail instead of their own email .I

Now all of my emails go through gmail and though it looks like my original email it works differently.

Xtra folders appear and disappear, emails disappear, and it checks for new messages when it wants to now ehn I want it o( I click on the 'get new mail' and nothing happens,not a single thing to let you know you even clicked the button.

I have an gmail account that I rarely use because I don't like it-messy and confusing to me.

But the ironic part is that I like Gmail and generally it's an improvement (for me) over all other kinds of email. But now it's doing the stupid hand-holding that makes all products worse for users who do know what they're doing. I really have no objection to those options being available (or even the default for new users-- I can imagine people who would find them useful). But I don't want them.

If you really don't like it, you can just access it remotely instead. Gmail is a complicated interface for what I think is a normal kind of email. I have my iPhone's "mail" app set up to access my Gmail account on the go, and the interface is very different, with "normal" options, nothing specific to Gmail.
So I don't see why you couldn't do the same. In my case, I actually want Gmail, just not the "enhanced" updates.